1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a system-model conversion method, a computer program, and a system-model converter for converting a system model.
2. Description of the Related Art
As for a case of describing a system model of software or a manufacturing industry in a cross-sectional way from multiple viewpoints, it is known that a larger scale of model elements involved therein makes an extraction work for the cross-sectional descriptions less efficient. For example, several methods of formally describing constraints have been heretofore proposed. However, it becomes more difficult to efficiently analyze and edit constraints as the number of the constraints becomes larger. Use of any of PD (Parametric Diagrams) of SysML (Systems Modeling Language), Visual OCL and Constraint Diagrams which are general-purpose graphical modeling languages enables relationships between constraints and system components that should meet the constraints to be described visually using blocks and links. However, in a case of describing the constraints for a large number of system components, the diagram ends up having so many blocks and links and becomes complicated so much that it is difficult to analyze and edit the constraints effectively. Nowadays, systems increasingly large in scale and high in complexity are built. Therefore, it is important to analyze and edit a large number of model elements in a hierarchical way based on multiple viewpoints.
OLAP (Online Analytical Processing) is known as one of methods of analyzing a huge amount of data. OLAP is a method of analyzing data by developing a multi-dimensional data model of a relational data structure with use of snapshots thereof, and is naturally defined as having final analysis results deployed into a Table/Matrix format. OLAP has been widely used in various kinds of analysis in actual operations, and the method has been established. Viewed from the opposite side, the efficient analysis method that handles a large amount of data using the table format is considered to be promising in the field of the system description.
However, most languages, such as SysML for a system description, Autosar (Registered Trademark) (Automotive Open System Architecture) which is a standard for a vehicle built-in software description, Simulink (Registered Trademark) which is commonly used for a control system description has as a basic data model a generic graph structure, which is not a data structure in a relational format. Thus, in order to pursue analysis in a Table/Matrix format, the two data models must be associated with each other properly.
Various methods have been disclosed for making associations between the relational model and the graph model having a graph structure. The network-database enquiry control system disclosed in Japanese Patent Application Publication No. 5-274348 refers to external schema information that defines, using a set, each relationship between records in the network database and internal schema information that defines the format for storing the network database in a storage device, and thereby generates network model information consisting of column information and set information in the relational database. On the basis of the network model information and the enquiry to the relational database, the network-database enquiry control system performs an enquiry to the network database.
The association information converter described in Japanese Patent Application Publication No. 6-250896 includes: input means for inputting a data structure of association information for database; attribute expression storage means for storing therein the information from the input means in the format of an association information expression in a metric space such as an n-dimensional Euclidean space; graph expression storage means for storing therein the information from the input means in the format of an association information expression in a graph structure consisting of nodes and arcs; attribute-expression/graph-expression conversion means for converting the information stored in the attribute expression storage means into the information stored in the graph expression storage means or vice versa; and output means for outputting information stored in the attribute expression storage means or the information stored in the graph expression storage means as the data structure of association information.
The database-model conversion method described in Japanese Patent Application Publication No. 2000-267906 generates tables corresponding to respective groups in a database of a network model, appends the parent-child association information and order information to a child record of a child group, and then stores the record in a child table.
However, the systems disclosed in Patent Literatures 1 to 3 and the like are not given the information on relationships between tables in the relational database obtained by the model conversion. For this reason, the systems described in Patent Literatures 1 to 3 and the like are incapable of operation such as generation of the relational models in a hierarchical way based on multiple viewpoints, and thereby do not facilitate the analysis and editing of a system model.
It is an object of the present invention to provide a system-model conversion method, a computer program, and a system-model converter which facilitate analysis and editing of a system model by using information indicating a hierarchical relationship.